Day Trip: Seattle

From the freeway, Seattle appears to be quite spread out but also very dense. Whereas Portland hillsides seem mostly tree-covered, Seattle's seem mostly structure-covered. We approached downtown from Seneca Street. At the top of the hill from the freeway off ramp there was a lovely, small garden planted in the concrete and the ivy was taking over. A much nicer welcoming than many other cities.

Overall, I found Seattle to be very likable. I haven't been there as an adult so I found it very appealing as a nice change away from Portland. The highlights of it were that everything was uniform, which settles what others refer to as my OCD. By this I mean that all the sidewalks were the same (clearly they didn't settle with patchwork concrete when doing construction) and there weren't numerous superfluous construction projects happening all over the place. It was also extremely clean. I've actually never seen a cleaner downtown in any city. (On a related note, I mentioned that to my friend who used to live there and she told me that it was all an illusion and that ONLY downtown is clean. Other friends validated that there are some scuzzy areas but agreed that in general, Seattle is cleaner than Portland.) We only saw two panhandlers the entire day, and there were no petitioners or signature collectors which also made the experience much more enjoyable.

The biggest drawback I noticed was that the downtown seemed sort of small. However, I felt this was outweighed by the fact that the tall buildings are taller than Portland's. I also would have liked to see what it looks like in the sun because with gray sidewalks and mostly gray buildings, it was a bit bland thanks to all the clouds and sprinkly weather. Another sort of aesthetic drawback was that there really weren't any old historical buildings in downtown---maybe they just weren't in the area we were in, but Portland definitely has an older, more historical feel.

To analyze myself, I think I am comparing Portland to Seattle for a few different reasons. 1) I am bored as hell after four years in Portland. 2) I am getting sick of all the construction, panhandling, signature collectors/petitioners bugging the hell out of me every time I try to go to work, or leave work, or take my lunch break, etc. 3) I want a change. Aside from meeting my close friends, Portland hasn't really given much back.